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Distinct polygamy concerns


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25 minutes ago, rongo said:

I'm certain that most men who were authorized to take other wives were wealthy enough to take care of multiple families (on paper --- there was some neglect as well). But, I know through my family history that some dirt poor men were authorized. My ancestors John W. Hess and Thomas Grover were wealthy, but the Frys, Joneses, Wildes, Toones, etc. were not. My Jones ancestor in particular had to eat the seed potatoes during a starving winter with his two wives and children. They were more than poor. My Jones ancestor was a peg leg who emigrated with a young son from England, and he lived in a tenement in Nauvoo with other poor people. There was also an element of worthiness and faithfulness as well (an ideal that wasn't always reached). 

Wildes and Toones had property next to ours in Morgan county.  Our families went back a long ways.

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4 minutes ago, rongo said:

In the past, this sort of thing has led to a number of "ask anything" Q&A things. People are really energized being able to discuss and ask about things like this. We'll walk before we run, though. The RS president wanted it to be sometime in July ( 😮!), and she was **really excited** when she asked me. 

I'm going to make sure the bishop supports and endorses it, of course, but I think he's solidly on board. 

I think in person question asking, even if you say “I don’t know, let me get back with you on that” can make a big impact as long as the presenter isn’t full of his own theories and promotes them more than the church’s position. Presenting the church’s official position first is important, also teaching when there is room for different ideas and interpretations is very, very important. Sharing personal ideas to demonstrate it is okay to have personal ideas and not to promote them is how I see that working best. This is where it would be nice to have a team teacher so that multiple viewpoints are shared. 
 

If you can’t find a team teacher to work with, maybe the RS presidency can meet with you and share their own ideas, you can point out (gently of course) if they have any misinformation or problems with their ideas, such as the false belief there were more women than men and it was therefore needed for that balance…though to go with gentleness, you could mention the problem of there being faithful men willing to get married to the available women at times as iirc there was some pushing of men to get married from the pulpit.  Still it needs to be clear that doesn’t address all the marriages as shown by the dropping of the marriage age for women in order to have additional pool of candidates for wives during some of the time….got off track…you could have the RS presidency share their own ideas with the group (after you have vetted and helped them refine their ideas) to help create a sense of ‘this is okay, maybe I can find what works for me’.

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6 minutes ago, sunstoned said:

Wildes and Toones had property next to ours in Morgan county.  Our families went back a long ways.

Would that be in Croydon? That's a really tiny place . . . :) 

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26 minutes ago, rongo said:

I'm certain that most men who were authorized to take other wives were wealthy enough to take care of multiple families (on paper --- there was some neglect as well).  

No they weren't. There wasn't that much wealth to get the participation they needed. And many men weren't following any rules, such as get permission from the existing wife or even an authority....especially when they were already polygamous. There are accounts of wives talking the husband into another wife...and plenty of stories of husbands going off on their own to court other women.  From what I can tell, any functioning man who wanted another wife would be "authorized" if he bothered to ask.  The point was to get everyone who was willing into polygamy, not to be selective....there were too many who wouldn't do it to be picky.

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5 minutes ago, Calm said:

I think in person question asking, even if you say “I don’t know, let me get back with you on that” can make a big impact

Absolutely! It's healthy for people to see that sometimes the answer is "I don't know," or that they will need to be gotten back to (and then the follow-up, of course). 

It's also fundamental what is doctrine (and what isn't), who determines doctrine, and who is authorized to speak for the Church. And, it's helpful to learn that speculation isn't something to be feared and isn't binding as long as people are clear on the ground rules of doctrine/not doctrine and who is authorized to speak for the Church. I already have thought that this would be the starting point. Not that speculation should be "peddled," but most reasons and explanations given are going to be at least partially speculative, and as long as people realize that, they can put together what works for them (if they want it to work for them). 

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4 minutes ago, juliann said:

No they weren't. There wasn't that much wealth to get the participation they needed. And many men weren't following any rules, such as get permission from the existing wife or even an authority....especially when they were already polygamous. There are accounts of wives talking the husband into another wife...and plenty of stories of husbands going off on their own to court other women.  From what I can tell, any functioning man who wanted another wife would be "authorized" if he bothered to ask.  The point was to get everyone who was willing into polygamy, not to be selective....there were too many who wouldn't do it to be picky.

Brigham Young and John Taylor spoke of turning men's requests down. I have no doubt that there were some men who left the rails and acted on their own, but we're talking about authorized polygamy. 

In Journal of Discourses, Wilford Woodruff and John Taylor put the number of men and women who participated in it at 10% of the Church. I know that this figure is argued about today, and I'm not sure how much can definitively be said today from the sources, but I've always been fascinated that so many did not participate in it. Especially since it was definitely a "sign" of status and "upper crust of the Church." 

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2 hours ago, sunstoned said:

Good points. JS did not follow what was laid out in sec 132.  To me it is clear what his motivation was. Polygamy was also a non starter for me. It was conceived in secrecy and practiced in secrecy.  I believe the fruits of modern LDS polygamy are rotten. both for the church and for all the break offs.  I feel the church should denounce it as a misguided mistake and as a practice that was not ordained from God.  Yes, it would ruffle some member's feathers,  I think that in the long run the church would be in a much better place.

JS did follow what was laid out in 132, polygyny and polyandry. The problem is the harshness of 132...it would be important to inform the RS that JS did not put this in the D&C, BY did much later. 

As for polygamy being rotten, come on. I'm a product of it. I admire my ancestors and am in awe of their sacrifices in coming to Utah and doing what they believed in. I'm also very proud of my ggrandfather for not abandoning his wives after the Manifesto. 

All the church needs to do is stop the speculation about polygamy in the afterlife, which they can easily do by making it public that they do seal women to two living husbands by special permission. This is where secrecy is hurting not only the church but women who think this is only for men.

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4 minutes ago, juliann said:

As for polygamy being rotten, come on. I'm a product of it. I admire my ancestors and am in awe of their sacrifices in coming to Utah and doing what they believed in. I'm also very proud of my ggrandfather for not abandoning his wives after the Manifesto. 

This is the most powerful argument for the fruits of it. The positive effects (as measured by faithful progeny today) continue to reverberate through generations. 

4 minutes ago, juliann said:

All the church needs to do is stop the speculation about polygamy in the afterlife, which they can easily do by making it public that they do seal women to two living husbands by special permission. This is where secrecy is hurting not only the church but women who think this is only for men.

Given the major handbook changes that have happened over the last few years, I'm surprised that this hasn't been mentioned in the handbook yet. It's rare, but it does happen (subject to FP approval). 

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51 minutes ago, rongo said:

I think this would more than just ruffle some members' feathers, and I think that the Church would never recover from it in the long run. It would call everything into question, and would be like pulling at a thread which, instead of coming out or breaking, keeps going and going until the whole fabric is unraveled. At a minimum, D&C 132 would have to be eliminated or heavily changed, and millions of people would have their "old" copies to compare with the edited versions. 

Those are just the practical reasons not to do this. 

It was eliminated after polygamy stopped. The D&C was redacted and reprinted. But fundamentalists won, so to be fair, the church did try. 

Quote

 

“Generating even more controversy in discussing the revelation was an officially sanctioned scriptural work entitled, Latter-day Revelations: Selections from the Book of Doctrine and Covenants of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Published in 1930 under the imprint of the LDS Church, the volume was actually compiled by James E. Talmage, who by this time was a senior apostle in the Quorum of the Twelve. This work was characterized as containing “Sections and parts of Sections from the Doctrine and Covenants, the sections comprising scriptures of general an enduring value…”. Its purpose, in the words of Talmage, was “to make the strictly doctrinal parts of the Doctrine and Covenants of easy access and reduce its bulk.” Accordingly some ninety-five sections of the Doctrine and Covenants were completely omitted, along with parts of twenty-one others. The most noteworthy of these omissions was the entire text of Section 132! Fundamentalist Mormons were outraged, “accusing the [LDS] church of changing the scriptures.” In response, then Church President Heber J. Grant, ordered the work immediately “withdrawn” from sale and the remaining copies “shredded to avoid further conflict with the fundamentalists,” according to Talmage biographer, James P. Harris.”
 
Newell G. Bringhurst, “Section 132: Contents and Legacy” in The Persistence of Polygamy, (Independence: John Whitmer Books: 2010), 83-84.

 

 

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13 minutes ago, rongo said:

Brigham Young and John Taylor spoke of turning men's requests down. I have no doubt that there were some men who left the rails and acted on their own, but we're talking about authorized polygamy. 

In Journal of Discourses, Wilford Woodruff and John Taylor put the number of men and women who participated in it at 10% of the Church. I know that this figure is argued about today, and I'm not sure how much can definitively be said today from the sources, but I've always been fascinated that so many did not participate in it. Especially since it was definitely a "sign" of status and "upper crust of the Church." 

https://issuu.com/utah10/docs/uhq_volume46_1978_number1/s/129529

this is a good article from the Utah Historical Society. I am having trouble cutting and pasting. It is a good summation of the troubled nature of polygamist marriages as shown through divorces. It also mentions that men who were trying to marry girls under 14 were denied permission. 

 

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3 minutes ago, juliann said:

It was eliminated after polygamy stopped. The D&C was redacted and reprinted. But fundamentalists won, so to be fair, the church did try. 

Fascinating.

Can you imagine eliminating it today? I think that would be more problematic for many than leaving it in. Everyone has some paper copies at home that could be compared. And, the Church doesn't explain changes, except to say that they "do not represent changes in doctrine." That would be really hard to say about decanonization, and the obvious next question would be "how can that be doctrine for so long,and then snap! suddenly no more?" 

 

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4 minutes ago, rongo said:

Fascinating.

Can you imagine eliminating it today? I think that would be more problematic for many than leaving it in. Everyone has some paper copies at home that could be compared. And, the Church doesn't explain changes, except to say that they "do not represent changes in doctrine." That would be really hard to say about decanonization, and the obvious next question would be "how can that be doctrine for so long,and then snap! suddenly no more?" 

 

I think it would be a smart move to remove it. It is harsh and treats women as things to be given. It could easily be redacted with an honest explanation that polygamy is no longer permitted and this is causing confusion, especially to new members. I don't understand why there needs to be any issue about removing something from canon, that doesn't mean they are trying to hide it or deny it. It merely places polygamy where it belongs...as a historical relic. 

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3 minutes ago, juliann said:

I think it would be a smart move to remove it. It is harsh and treats women as things to be given. It could easily be redacted with an honest explanation that polygamy is no longer permitted and this is causing confusion, especially to new members. I don't understand why there needs to be any issue about removing something from canon, that doesn't mean they are trying to hide it or deny it. It merely places polygamy where it belongs...as a historical relic. 

I think the first part of 132 is still very useful.  Maybe everything after verse 28 could be moved to sit next to the Official Declaration 1 as an explanation for it.  Probably should also add the second manifesto as well.  I find it strange that it still isn't mentioned next to the Official Declaration 1.

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1 hour ago, rongo said:

This reminds me of some funeral talks in Journal of Discourses. Unlike today, when even the most worthless of wretches gets the best spin possible, there were several where the speaker said, essentially, "This man led a profligate life, and is not going to the celestial kingdom. No point sugar-coating it. Let it inspire us to get our acts together." 

While you're obviously right that obituaries don't tell the whole story, I'm kind of glad that people don't get thrown under the bus in them, or at their funerals. 

Yes, me too!

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1 hour ago, Calm said:

What about finding a woman who is interested in the subject, appears to be relatively strong in faith and able to handle questions of herself and others and is willing to study?  Meet with her first and prepare her with the questions you are discussing here and work with her to refine the answers, including giving her a list of resources and having her come back to you with her conclusions and additional questions. 

Then when both of you are prepared, team teach the activity. 

I was going to say his wife could help, and then forgot she's been having some medical issues, I hope she gets well soon. 

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1 hour ago, rongo said:

This is the most powerful argument for the fruits of it. The positive effects (as measured by faithful progeny today) continue to reverberate through generations. 

Given the major handbook changes that have happened over the last few years, I'm surprised that this hasn't been mentioned in the handbook yet. It's rare, but it does happen (subject to FP approval). 

I'm a product of polygamy on my mother's side. So when I said it was bad fruit in my post as well, it is because of the sects that took it and turned it into a scary cult and controlled people to the point of no return almost, speaking of the FLDS and Warren Jeffs is still running it from prison. He has told the men that they aren't to have sex, probably because he can't. I heard the other day that there are no children being born for like two years now. Now that is the rotten fruit I speak of, and without the polygamy having started in the church, it's a good bet that this wouldn't have happened. 

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2 hours ago, juliann said:

I don't understand why there needs to be any issue about removing something from canon, that doesn't mean they are trying to hide it or deny it. It merely places polygamy where it belongs...as a historical relic. 

Removing something from the canon is a big problem as it then initiates the conversation that perhaps other things should be removed from the canon.   How important really is the canon if it can just be removed?  If one was to remove D&C 132 then what really is the foundation of much eternal marriage, exaltation, ect?  If anything, it such an action would show that the Constitution is more inspired than the canon.  Amendments to the constitution are never removed.  They are only amended or updated with a new amendment but the old is never removed.

We don't remove law of Moses stuff from the Old Testament even though that law is fulfilled.  I think whatever problem that might be resolved by removing something would open a can of worms far greater than what would be removed.

Edited by carbon dioxide
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4 hours ago, rongo said:

I guess you're not the target audience.

I'm definitely not going to burn everything down and say it was all not of God, full stop. My mandate is for this to be an atmosphere of faith, and this isn't what the RS president wants or envisions. It's also not what I believe.

Oh, that’s right. I’m a woman, so I can’t have an opinion about polygamy.  Especially if it differs from the party (men’s) line.  Gotta send a man in to teach in RS, because we couldn’t possibly trust one of those darn women to teach. 

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4 hours ago, rongo said:

In the past, this sort of thing has led to a number of "ask anything" Q&A things. People are really energized being able to discuss and ask about things like this. We'll walk before we run, though. The RS president wanted it to be sometime in July ( 😮!), and she was **really excited** when she asked me.

So she doesn't want anyone there when it happens? I sometimes feel we are the only ones who haven't left the valley in July as so many go to where it is cooler.  Church was so empty this week. I was shocked how quickly the sacrament was passed.

4 hours ago, rongo said:

 

I'm going to make sure the bishop supports and endorses it, of course, but I think he's solidly on board. 

 

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4 hours ago, Rain said:

So she doesn't want anyone there when it happens? I sometimes feel we are the only ones who haven't left the valley in July as so many go to where it is cooler.  Church was so empty this week. I was shocked how quickly the sacrament was passed.

That's like the ward we moved from. We're out where the new growth is (San Tan Valley), and our ward is busting at the seams with youth and children. Vacations are winding down, because most schools start in late July (that's never made sense to me --- having school in late July and August, when it's hottest, but that's Arizona for you).

I don't think the thing itself will take place until August at the earliest.

Edited by rongo
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11 hours ago, JLHPROF said:

We could do all that.

But we'd be wrong and telling falsehoods.

Incorrect.  I have said nothing false.  I have looked at the original documentation.  I have looked at every single piece of original contemporary evidence for JS practicing, preaching polygamy. And it all falls completely and utterly apart.  Every single piece of evidence was written decades after the fact.  Even DC 132 has huge question marks behind it.

The biggest key in this is that everyone looks at Joseph Smith but ignore Brigham Young. No one argues that Brigham Young was NOT a polygamist, no one argues that Brigham Young did NOT marry Augusta Cobb in 1843, nor Decker in 1842.  And yet, where is the evidence that BY was commanded to do so by JS?  There is none.  The same is true with the other men who had polygamous wives prior to Joseph Smith's death who stayed members of the Church.

There is not a single shred of contemporary evidence that these men were commanded by God through JS to do what they did. It simply does not exist.  Now certainly it's possible; it's possible that Joseph Smith lied in public and private and had kept polygamy so incredibly secret that no one knew...but when one goes to the original documentation it's all a pack of lies.

The "Happiness Letter", we all know.  "Happiness is the object of our design".  Total fraud. John C. Bennet claimed that Joseph Smith wrote the letter, yet Bennet never produced the actual letter and the words were produced in a newspaper.  Bennet (a known liar, philander) could not produce a single bit of evidence that JS wrote the letter . . .except to say he did.

As for Fanny Alger; individuals should look at what words actually meant back in the 1820s as words have changed meaning.  The easier one to demonstrate this is the word "gay", which 60 years ago had a completely different connotation. The word "affair" in the 1820s did not mean anything sexual.  The word "scrape" did not have a sexual undertone.

https://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/affair

"In the singular, it is used for a private dispute, or duel; as, an affair of honor; and sometimes a partial engagement of troops."
https://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/scrape
"Difficulty; perplexity; distress; that which harasses."

It is pretty obvious with Fanny Alger, considering how quickly she left after supposedly being "married" to JS that it wasn't a marriage at all.  It's a pretty easy thing to understand; Fanny was hired to do a job for Emma, a dispute arose most likely in her duties and this required some correction, some dispute occurred and she was fired. It is even possible that she attempted to flirt with or give eyes to Joseph

Sadly, we all know that plenty of women will throw themselves at men who they perceive as higher on the social/economical hierarchy (rockstars, football players, etc.).  Not a single word from Joseph Smith either public or private has ANY indication that he was ever in the least bit not fully committed to Emma.

I have read every single letter written to/from Joseph in the Joseph Smith Paper's project from 1842-1844 and every single letter written to Emma.  It is obvious that he was 100% committed to her and everything else is a bunch of malarky.

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9 hours ago, rongo said:

I think this would more than just ruffle some members' feathers, and I think that the Church would never recover from it in the long run. It would call everything into question, and would be like pulling at a thread which, instead of coming out or breaking, keeps going and going until the whole fabric is unraveled. At a minimum, D&C 132 would have to be eliminated or heavily changed, and millions of people would have their "old" copies to compare with the edited versions. 

Those are just the practical reasons not to do this. 

Yes, this is very true.  However, truth will eventually win out.  At some point, the consequences of continuing to create this utter and complete fiction that Joseph Smith instituted polygamy will be more than the consequences of coming clean.

The Church has done these things on a small scale from time to time; various GC talks are removed or edited or not transcribed properly.

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8 hours ago, rongo said:

I really appreciate everyone's input and participation in this thread! There are many more potential concerns than I had originally brainstormed. Thank you, @Calm and @YJacketfor bringing up the theories about Joseph Smith being fully absolved (it was all Brigham Young's fault!). I've added this to the OP. I know that these have some cachet among some today, and it's not only demonstrably incorrect, it could be a source of concern. I hadn't considered that. 

If anyone has any doubt about this, I also HIGHLY encourage everyone to read the actual minutes from every single Relief Society meeting in 1843-1844; which I have.  In the actual minutes it is clearly obvious that the ENTIRE reason for the Relief Society was to primarily root out polygamy. Secondary was to give aid to the poor. Every single time Emma presided, which were the only meetings where anything got done, there was discussion on proper virtuous instruction to the women of the Church. There was instruction on finding out if rumors of certain women trading sexual favors for food, or for companionship were true and if they were the women were instructed to call those women to repentance.  To instruct the women to not fall prey to men in high places asking for sexual favors.

To say that Emma and Joseph were out of step on this is ridiculous, or that Emma was doing something that Joseph did not want is to defy logic and reason.  Especially when combining those Relief Society meeting minutes with the letters that Joseph wrote to Emma during that time.  

Shoot, Joseph Smith took one day and literally rode/walked up and down the public streets in Nauvoo, proclaiming to all that a man was to ONLY have one wife-this is in the original journal entry.  It was later doctored to say something else. 

When you tally up all the public AND private entries from Joseph Smith, Emma, the Relief Society notes, Hyrum Smith, them excommunicating any unrepentance polygamist, to where there is absolutely nothing, and I do mean nothing in public or private contemporary records that have ANY indication that Joseph Smith was practicing polygamy . . . well it creates a clear picture.

There is evidence of "sealings", the problem is that we say that a "sealing" is the same thing as "marriage" and it's not.  There IS record and evidence of Joseph Smith sealing men to himself; does this mean he is also a homosexual? Did he commit sodomy with other men?

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